Dear Running,

Dear Running, 

​It's been over 21 years of ups and downs, and I have grown so much. I have a lot of words to say on this global running day, but most of all I can only say ​thank you. 

Thank you for the confidence I never knew I had.
Thank you for the friendships I've gained across the years,
Thank you for the bond I share with members of my family,
Thank you for my family. Without you, maybe we wouldn't be here.
Thank you for the opportunities.
So many opportunities.

Opportunities to connect with my inner self,
Opportunities to breathe when we often don't take them,
Opportunities to pray,
Opportunities to sweat,
Opportunities to move my body... especially as I age and being an athlete loses it's glory.
Opportunities for the glory... even if I thought it was bigger (much bigger) than it actually was.
I thought I was the shit... Thanks for teaching me humility too.

I learned a lot through success, but even more through failure.
Man, you gave me so many opportunities to fail.
...and fail ugly
... I was a sore loser at times.... but you didn't care. I even embarrassed myself for how I accepted failure (or didn't accept failure) but you were still there. I was so young and passionate, and growing.
I needed the opportunities that you continued to give me.
​Opportunities to fail again
and fail a bit more gracefully each time.
... so many lessons in the failures.
a constant reminder that I can choose to stay down or get back up.

I learned to get up when I failed in other aspects of life too.
I learned to understand that failure is part of the process to success across all endeavors, not just with you.

I was once a 12 year old girl checking the oven clock, and jumping out the door racing a few blocks to see how fast I could go and realizing, by most peoples standards, I could go fast.

But fast wasn't enough.
I wanted more.
There once was a time I wanted you to go away.
You haunted my dreams.
I wanted my dreams to be real so badly and I got mad when they weren't.
I felt like you owed it to me.
For all the time and energy I put in.
You owed me ...

I was owed a victory or owed a PR or owed healthy leg (or foot, or hip, or back <<<>insert injuries here <>>>), or owed back time in my life that I invested where things didn't pan out the way I thought they ought to... (Like that time I missed Nationals by .24 seconds. That wasn't fun.) ...

If you weren't going to give me those things...
GET OUT!
I didn't want you anymore....

But I didn't know life without you so I just kept going...
and kept growing...
and kept changing...

and now I'm a mom. I'm still racing that oven clock... but most often for things like if I burnt the food yet, or shuffling out the door to get to work, or dance, or daycare always in a hurray, always moving fast. .....I race that oven clock for bedtime... how fast can I get kids to bed so I can get a bit of time to breathe again? When can I breathe?

I used to think I was giving to you.
I was giving you my time
giving you my energy
giving you my life
and all you could do was just be
and never give
so I got nothing in return.

or so I thought.

but you do give
You give me time to breathe.
Every day I get to run I get to breathe...
I used to want everything so fast but now, when I run, it finally slows down.
No matter what pace I run, the world slows down.
You give me that opportunity to live in the moment
see the beauty in all the world
forget about all the things I have to worry about
and just be.

Being able to just be is powerful.
You are that for me
You give that to me

Thank you.

PS: I still do want to run fast, though. Let’s get it right this time!